During the last days I was too busy and at the end of the day too tired to write a narration. I’ll write about the last days late.

Under a clear sky MaRe heads in her normal night gown, main reef 2, genoa fully out, with STW of around 6 KN, towards Nuku-Hiva.

The sea is smooth despite a TWS of 16 – 17 KN. Measured temperatures at navigation table is 27 degC. At the helm station it just feels nice when the wind runs over the skin.

On the radar no ships are to be seen. Perfect.

I’m feeling hungry now and will have a muesli with an orange.

I got up early for the last preparations. Started the engines for lifting the anchor. Pulled it up and had to clean the first about 5 m with a brush. Then pulled up more when suddenly the chain blocked. Played the game “release and pull again. Didn’t get up. Used additionally an anchor claw and pulled with the mast winch. Could not get it up.

I’m the meantime my new neighbor’s boat came pretty close to MaRe. That’s because I told them that I leaving. Thus, I hesitated to dive down to see what the situation is. However, my new neighbor offered to dive.

The problem was that the chain was pulled under an old mooring block. With turning MaRe around a bit and some help from my friendly neighbor, the chain came free and the anchor up.

Gosh, I was happy! Thanking my neighbors and bidding farewell, I left the bay.

Outside I had, as expected, around 15 KN of wind from E, a swell of 1.5 – 2 m but pretty short, only about 50 m, and l wind waves of about up to a meter. Not bad.

I put MaRe with the autopilot into the wind and hoisted the main. Went back on course, unfurled the genoa and sailed. As always, since I sailed on the “sleeper”, the race boat in Japan in the 90ies, I enjoy the moment I can switch off the engines, and MaRe is propelled only by the wind.

Coming closer to the eastern entrance of the Canal du Bordelais I turned MaRe in westerly direction. But the wind direction was not that good. I got the wind from more than 150 deg PRT. With that AWA MaRe sails better with only the genoa, because the genoa is too much covered by the main.

As the Canal du Bordelais is only about 3 NM long, I didn’t want to get the main down and up again at the end of canal. So I furled the genoa and pushed about 2 NM with the engines and the main towards the end of the canal. When I started turning S, the AWA became quickly less than 150 deg PRT, and I pulled the genoa out again to sail to the entrance of the bay of Vaitahu. MaRe and I enjoyed the sailing. We passed the Hanamoenoa Bay were we stayed already twice.

Only minutes later I could change the course to enter the bay of Vaitahu. There were only 2 sailboats in and lots of space. Space is what’s needed. Because I could feel the strong wind coming down the long the mountains slopes into the short and narrow valley. I dropped the anchor at about 11 m of water. The seabed is indicated as sand, thus I got an excellent hold. I gave 60 m of chain and the anchor had a firm grip at 1800 RPM backwards. Engines off. I was safe in the bay.

Looking around, I liked the green lush former volcanic slopes. The village of Vaitahu is small and crammed at the very end of the valley just before the shore. I’m curious how it will be when I walk through it.

First I was hungry and are the last bread – tomorrow is bread baking day.

A short rest, and then I went under water to clean MaRe’s hulls. In one and half hour I could do a lot. Tomorrow I’ll do the rest.

After dinner, I was pretty tired, and after a friend called me, I went into bed with my sleeping partner, the anchor alarm on my tablet PC.

During the last days I was pretty busy. Boat jobs, emails, IT work, provisioning…

Yesterday day morning, I was pretty good in my planned schedule, when I had to do about 4 h of IT work. This meant standing – not sitting because of a lumbago I got 3 days ago – at my PC while MaRe, pushed by the wind to be parallel to the swell of 1/2 m, rocked to her best. “Nice” working conditions. By the end of my day I got all done needed to depart tomorrow.

Wind is supposed to be nice. Easterly around 15 KN.

Looking forward to sailing again. Just miss my OBM on board.

After a leisurely breakfast with cheese and a bit of chorizo I started working.

First PC work.

First first – I was studying the coding of the US NOAA ENC charts (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration). With the help of ChatCPT, I could understand the first 5 of the 8 digit code, with the first 5 being the most important ones for me. These charts are weekly updated and free of charge for everyone for downloading. With this, they are better than the Navionics Charts, the standard for yachts, I now can use OpenCPN to view these charts or I can find out if they can be imported into the Axiom. The later one is my preferred solution.

Disadvantage of these charts: They are only available for US water. Fortunately they cover a big part of Micronesia and Hawaiian water down to American Samoa.

First second – I worked on the provisioning list for the next weeks. Kind of work I don’t like to do but I have to do.

Second

Second first – I cleaned the STB aft cabin, a work that takes quite some time. But now it’s done.

Second second – I maintained all windows and hatches. A work, which is a part of the regular maintenance tasks.

Third, I had dinner, and did some laundry

Fourth, I took my evening shower

Fifth, I went into my bed.

Sixth, I uploaded this narration.

Already a few days ago I saw the locally built hulls of a Polynesian catamaran. Then I saw it in the water with hulls being solidly connected to each other.

Today, in the late afternoon I saw this boat along side the supply boat Taporo IX and thought they might lift her on deck for transportation to Nuku-Hiva. But then I saw that they only used a crane of the Taporo IX to set up the mast. It was fascinating to watch how they rigged this beautifully built boat using ropes of about 2 – 3 cm diameter. 6 ropes from the top of the mast and 4 from the middle. It looks pretty solid.

Now the question is if they do sail the boat to Nuku-Hiva or motor all the way up. (There is a solid metal framed construction between the hulls which could carry am outboard motor.)

I’m really curious what will happen next!

With Ralf’s explanation on how to deal with the sea charts, I got the breakthrough in using openCPN.

With openCPN I will be able to additionally use satellite images as well. Bing and Google charts are provided off-line.

The Alternative would be to get the satellite images into my Axiome as well. There’s is still some work to be done.

Thus, during the last days I spent hours at land to download charts. 50 – 55 of 60 GB are downloaded.

Next week one time more and I get all what I need into my PC.

This morning, at around 0530 I heard the deep and loud sound of a ship’s horn.

My first thought was that one of the supply boats wants to get in the bay. I also knew from yesterday evening that there are about 4 sailboats anchoring in an area a supply boats needs for maneuvering. MaRe is at anchor, out of the way of the supply boats.

I got up and saw that I was right. The boats in Araniu 5’s way lifted the anchor and moved with their engines between the other boats until Aranui 5 was docked at the pier.

It’s an interesting maneuver she is doing. First she lowers 2 tenders into the water. Then, In the middle of the bay she drops her PRT anchor, and with the chain tight l, she turns her stern STB side towards the pier. Once she is sufficiently close to the pier, one tender gets a very long bow line and and the other a stern line. They bring the end of the lines on land to fix it there. Then, with the help of strong winches, the Aranui 5 pulls herself to the pier where she will be secured with some more lines.

Unloading of the cargo started straight away and gets in full swing in no time.

I’m curious what I will get in 2 – 3 days in the food shop.

On the 4th I decided to finally go to Atuona to watch the training of the dancers for the big Polynesian festival at Nuku-Hiva.

I arrived shortly before 1800.
Many gathered already on the open, about football field size, grass covered area of the Centre Culturelle d’Atuona, Hiva-Oa.
A place for Polynesian cultural events, framed and with larger, men sized lava stones carved tikis. (For tikis see link to Wikipedia in 231103 Shopping for food.)

There was already a percussion band of about 10 – 15 drummers with various sizes of drums. Some are as high as my chest.

The waiting people sang a Polynesian song. Got the impression that’s a warm up while
more and more people gathered.

Suddenly they sang Happy Birthday for someone who celebrated his or her anniversary.

A moderator read a text in Polynesia, the group replied. Later it became song with a wonderful sound. The singing is a part of the training

Then the group dispersed to change into a new line up of the people. Basic position for a dance was taken.

Then a new song started. To me it sounded like a prayer. Everyone in the big group had the head bent down.

Later I was able to estimate the group as consisting of about 80 women and 80 men. Together with drummers and some supporting people 200 people. A big number when one considers that the population is about 2000 of the whole island.

Then the voices got louder and the group moves forward. Their movements become a dance, with the drums making the rythm. What an atmosphere!

The sound of the big drums can not only be heard but even felt on my chest. What a power these drummers used. All is unplugged; no mikes, no amplifiers and no speakers.

While the women sang in their natural voice, the men sang in a very deep voice with guttural sounds.

The swinging hips of the women together with the soft and kind of swinging, wave like movements of arms and hands just looks peaceful, gentle, graceful, and underlined by their smiling faces.

The men’s dances appeared as if they want to threaten an invisible enemy or stimulate themselves for a big fight. They also held maces in their hands. The steps of their dances were stamping, the movements of their arms powerful. I felt that during the men’s dance the drums were driving even more. What a contrast between female and male performance.

Although I don’t understand the Marquesian language, I got the impression that both the women and the men identified themselves with the lyrics of their songs and the movements of their bodies.

At the beginning, the female and male group performed separately but the group movement was tuned to each other. Later, step by step the positions where structured mixed and it became one group of estimated 160 dancers.

The choreography of the dances is rather complex, requiring lots of training; so are the rythms and beats of the drums.

In between there was also the sound of big shells to be heard.

Suddenly I recognized something unusual. The women all dance barefoot and the man mostly wore sneakers. I assume that they came from work directly for the training and just kept the shoes on they use for working.

A gentle breeze make the temperature and the atmosphere very pleasant. Only my bum hurted after a while sitting on lava cut stone with only little grass grown on it.

After a break of about 1/2 hour trusting continued. All in all it was an almost 2 hour event.

On my way home, still walking in the village, I started to hitchhike. A lady stopped and have me a ride. Accidentally I recognized her as one of the dancers. She was very happy that I recognized her, but I also got the feeling that she’s happy and content because of the dancing and singing she did the last two hours.

Just before she dropped me at the gas station, we passed the first hull of a Pollynesian
catamaran they newly built and she told me, with lots of joy that her husband works on that boat project. The hull is about 15 m long so the beam could be 7 – 8 m. I’m curious to see this traditional boat when it’s ready.

After I left her car wishing her a “Bonne Soirée”, I recognized that she did not need to go somewhere in the vicinity of the gas station, but just brought me there, before going back to her home closer to the Atuona.
What a wonderful gesture!

My “favorite” app is the Offshore App is PredictWind. It’s the app through which I get my weather forecast and through which I upload these narrations.

The connection can go either through my IridiumGO satellite phone or the mobile phone internet connection.

Why do I call it “favorite”? Keep reading!

Recently, I updated the app on both on my mobile phone. Results: my Huawei phone did not connect anymore to the PredictWind server. Neither via the mobile phone internet connection nor via the satellite phone connection of my Iridium GO.

The app in bq phone connected only via mobile phone internet.

However both phones connect to the Iridium server to exchange emails. My conclusion is the Offshore App doesn’t connect to the PredictWind server. Such a bug is simply annoying.

Recently, I observed and tested the most funniest bug I’ve ever come across.

I used my bq phone and the internet connection via the hotspot of my Huawei phone to upload my narrations.

This because with my Huawei phone I could not reach the PredictWind server. Then, accidentally I saw a narration uploaded via my bq phone in the Offshore App of my Huawei phone. How can this happen when I can’t connect to the PredictWind server to upload/download narrations?

Thus, over the next days I performed tests. Whenever I uploaded a narration via my bq phone I opened about 2 min later my Huawei phone and saw the narration on the Huawei phone as well. How can this happen when I could not get a connection to the PredictWind server to upload a narration with my Huawei phone at all?

My assumption is that the Offshore App is permanently open in the background and downloads data by itself. Conclusion: a “perfectly programmed” app or another bug in the accumulation of bugs.

I uninstalled the up-to-date apps and installed an older version for which I fortunately got download link from Keryn of PredictWind support. Without Keryn, I would have changed my weather forecast already.

The newly installed older version on my Huawei phone connects now again to the PredictWind server via mobile phone internet and satellite connection.

The app in my bq phone I need to reinstall again because it doesn’t work. The PredictWind Offshore App, an accumulation of bugs which works somehow if one knows a few tricks, thus my “favorite” app.

For fairness reasons I want to mention that the older version runs on my tablet PC with the normal, never removed bugs and I can get my weather reports.

I did lots of small boat jobs. Things, I wanted to do since long. One of it was maintenance of the gas range and the oven. The oven is not yet perfect thus I have to do it again.

I also made about 300 l of fresh water yesterday evening after the swell got less during the last 2 days resulting in less sediments in the water. Nevertheless I need to exchange the 5 micron pre-filter I expected that this needs an exchange soon because the low pressure of the water maker went down always a bit more.

Also did daily some IT work again and always emails and messages.

Things I need to be brought from Europe arrived at the delivery address already and arrive in time.

The weather is wonderful. Sunny with cumulus clouds and always a nice breeze, which makes the temperature of 30 degC very pleasant. Rain, especially during the night got less. Last night the temperature went down so much that I needed to grab my light summer bed. A pleasant temperature to sleep with the hatch open.